Archive for the ‘ideas’ Category

I bet everybody has tried to learn touch typing at least once but as it is so hard to get rid of your old habits the idea of re-learning is soon dropped. I think I might have found a solution.

I had to type a document in Russian using the Cyrillic alphabet. In order to do that I had to use JCUKEN (ЙЦУКЕН) – a Cyrillic keyboard layout – but did not have Russian characters inscribed on my keyboard. As a solution I made a little note with the letter sequence of each row and stuck it to the bottom of my screen.

At first I red the text I had to type, then I looked at my little cheat sheet at the bottom of the screen, and then I tried to type my text. In this case staring at the keyboard did not do any good as there was nothing to see.

Soon I realized that I am trying to memorize which letters are those two with the little raised dots on them and how other letters are positioned in relation to them. Just in few hours I could feel my progress.

Conclusion – if you want to learn touch typing, get a blank keyboard. Many of us like to peek at the keys when we are typing, but with the blank keyboard it would not be a problem as there won’t be anything to look at 🙂

I heard about this idea before – food growing machine which won the Electrolux Design Lab Competition. It grows meat and fish from heated animal cells. I was amazed.

Few days ago I read about Cocoon again. My first thought was – “they finally started the production!” and “where can I get one?” Unfortunately it is still just a concept and Electrolux is not planning to include Cocoon in their product line.

I really would not mind eating “meat born in a small kitchen appliance”. Especially when I think about forests and meadows saved from being turned into the pastures. Cocoon would be one more way of helping to save the environment.

I got fascinated about the idea of private poetry readings in a sexy sultry way in a saloon-type environment.

More precisely – I am talking about poetry brothels. I first encountered the idea on the plane reading a magazine. They had an article about a poetry brothel in Barcelona. As far as I know there are three of them now: one in New York, one in Barcelona & one in Leicester (UK).

Reading as a recreational activity has gone into decline. I bet even less people spend their time reading poetry. Poetry brothels will bring back the attractiveness of the written word put into rhymes.

In the era when entertainment and new experience plays such a big role in creating people’s happiness poetry brothels might be just the right thing to indulge yourself with. And it wont be just a temporal treat. This experience may have a pleasant long lasting impression on your mind and soul.

When we do something, we want to do it well. If it is related to our business, we want it very good. And then we are analyzing and planning, and analyzing again. But sometimes preparation kills all the process. It’s just too long. And when we finally are ready to take action it’s closing the barn door after the horse has bolted.

Though there is a solution to that. As Jimmy Guterman writes in his blog: it’s by screwing up that we learn and discover (in Why screwing up is the smartest thing you can do). That means we just have to pick a direction and move. No hesitation, no procrastination, no playing safe. Just go and do it. Because only quick enough action will bring us in front of the competitors. And by trying long and hard enough you will be able to make enough mistakes so that one of them will be brilliant and will make you number one, like CocaCola, 3M or Pfizer (produces Viagra) who became world leaders by failing significantly.